By Joyce Alexander, RNP (retired)
One of the things I have heard from victims of psychopaths here at Lovefraud, seemingly over and over, is that people compare their losses to my losses and Donna’s losses and Dr. Liane Leedom’s losses, etc. and think that their losses don’t “count” because they haven’t lost X, Y, or Z and we did. They seem to think that because I lost a child, or Liane lost her medical practice, or Donna lost a quarter of a million dollars, that they are not entitled to feel as injured as we were/are.
The people expressing this somehow seem to have “survivor’s guilt” about feeling so devastated when their losses were somehow “less.” Or they feel that we are somehow “super heroes” because we survived “big losses.”
I felt that way too when I was reading Dr. Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning. Dr. Frankl wrote the book after his years in a German Nazi concentration camp, in which he lost everything except his life, and barely retained that.
Pain is like gas
I felt that my own losses didn’t compare to Dr. Frankl’s losses, and that somehow I should feel guilty for feeling such great pain and desperation. Then I read Dr. Frankl’s explanation of how pain operates like a gas.
In science, we learn that a gas, because it has atoms that are far apart, will expand until it completely fills an empty container. It will also compress easily so that a larger amount of the gas can be put into a small container. In any case, the container is full. It is totally filled.
I realized upon reading this that my pain was just as “total” as Dr. Frankl’s, and that my losses were just as “big” (or “small”) as his were. All pain and all loss is total. If something is important to us, we value it and when we lose it, we grieve for that loss. We feel pain, which is what grief is.
Grief process
The “grief process,” as Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross explains it, is an emotional process where we come to grips with loss, and eventually come to acceptance of that loss.
Dr. Kubler-Ross’s grief process consists of denial, bargaining, sadness, anger and acceptance. These five stages of grief are not processed in a linear 1-2-3-4-5 formula, but in alternating steps, more like 1-3-4-2-3-4-1-2-4-5. Eventually we come to and stay in the last stage, which is acceptance of the loss.
A baby who drops his pacifier is totally in misery and pain. He cries from the depth of his soul’s loss that his grief is total, his pain is total and his life is ”˜ruined,’ because he doesn’t have his pacifier. Of course we know that his life is not ruined, he will recover, but he doesn’t know this at that time because he doesn’t have the knowledge and experience to know he will come to acceptance of his loss and recover.
Pain is proportional
When we lose something that we care about, our pain is in proportion to how much something means to us. If we drop a penny, usually we will not be devastated. We know that we will still be able to buy lunch, pay the mortgage and go on with life. But if we drop the bank deposit for our business and lose it, it is another matter entirely. Now we may not be able to make payroll and things will get very bad, so our loss is bigger and we grieve over the problems this will cause, the bigger loss.
When we are devastated by the loss of a “great love,” or by the betrayal of someone we trusted, depended on and cared for, we have suffered a great and grievous loss that rocks our world. It isn’t anything we can put a dollar value on; it is an emotional attachment that has no price. How do you quantify “love?”
When we have lost something that is of utter value to us, whether it is something that we can quantify, or whether it has no monetary value, only value of the heart, the soul, then we must realize that our grief is total. We must not compare our losses to what someone else has lost and feel that their loss is “greater,” because it isn’t greater. The pain isn’t greater. It is all TOTAL LOSS. The pain is total.
So if you start to feel that your loss is nothing compared to someone else’s loss, Stop! Realize that your loss, your pain, is your loss and pain. No one else’s is more or less.
Tony77
Sebbo,
I recommend you (and anyone else dealing with a sociopath) to listen to this song.
This song is called “Crushing Day” by Joe Satriani.
Just remember – one day all these sociopaths will have to kneel at God’s alter and beg for forgiveness.
You, me, Silverspoon and anyone else affected by Sociopaths will be behind the alter with God and we will be sending these organisms to HELL.
This will be known as “Crushing day”.
Have a look at this video and listen to its wonderful sounds (and the wonderful expression he gives while playing the guitar).
Cheers
Tony
CRUSHING DAY :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMYdlOmGnmk
Back_from_the_edge
Thanks Tony77…
Yes, I do understand what being stuck in that nightmare is like. I have been there myself for a great many years. I think we all can relate. It IS a terrible situation when someone has shafted us so severely. But it doesn’t lessen us as a person. The shame is not on “US” but on “THEM”.
Believe in yourself….
Wishes and prayers,
Dupey
breckgirl
Some of the best advice I got when I was recovering from my relationship with my MN and was in deep pain was to set a limit on how much time I would give myself to suffer each day. So for awhile I was obsessed with it and I started with a limit of 45 minutes – and once I started to think or obsess – I had a friend who would listen and helped me through this – I would vent, write, read – grieve. But when that 45 minutes was up I had to wrap it up and for the rest of the day if the thought of him came to mind I would tell myself that I had had my grieving session for the day and it would have to wait until the next day. It was a wonderful technique my friend got from her therapist and it worked.
Of course in the initial stages I was suffering from drama withdrawals – the loss of the ups and downs of the adrenalin and cortisol being activated by his behavior – it is purposeful that behavior – it is how they train you to respond – Pavlovian like. He used to tell me he needed to train me and I would laugh – the laugh was on me.
Tony77
Sebbo
When a relationship stops, you have to accept her to be with another man.
As hard as it is visualizing her making love with another man, you need to put that thought in the back of your mind.
Yes she was a sociopath.
Yes she was highly promiscuous.
But arent you better off without her?
Why would you want to reminisce over a woman
who clearly did not love you and was always searching
for sex with other guys while with you?
skylar
breckgirl,
no the laugh was on him. He was so lacking in a “being”, so lacking in existence, that he pours all his energy into manipulating people who have a “being”. His envy is his driving force. How pathetic is that?
The fact is, you will get over your experience of him — he will not. He’s doomed to be who he is, by his own choice and his inability to make any other choice. He’s stuck playing the same games in the same sandbox, just like the infant that he is. Too bad nobody will change his diaper for him.
libelle
Dear Sebbo, I can relate to you. Everybody was telling me how lucky I was to have escaped, but I felt so miserable and COMPLETELY totally devastated. I felt as if the other ones were giving me punches in the stomach in top of my pain! That they would be ruthless and unsensitive to my pain. And on top there was this longing for the hugs, although it dawned me that they were fake ones, a charade, mechanical, like in a porno movie. And THEN I felt used and abused, like a life inflatable doll.
The bad thing is that the pain only stops when you walk THROUGH the pain, the dark tunnel with no light in it at first.
When you think it will be better by returning, the tunnel only will become longer, and you have the restraining order threat pending as a non refundable inhibition to return.
And remember: she is a hooker who went after your money, and she disguised as a lover to get even more money out of you. You saw behind her mask, and that made her angry. VERY classical!
Night is darkest just befor dawn! We accompany you on your walk through this tunnel, but you have to walk on your own on your own pace. I am sure you will make it very well, and you sound so much better than the last days! It takes time, so take your time. Meanwhile we are here for you. (((Hugs)))
Sebbo_Ricadonna
Dear Libbel
Thanks for your heartfelt words.
I really apreciate it.
Yeah I know. Its terrible. I’m trying so hard.
I’m trying to do different things each day.
I’m trying to meet people.
But at the back of my mind I am having
nightmares about her flirting and seducing
other men.
I am having nightmares in my sleep of
her having intercourse with other men.
I know it sounds almost lewd, but this is
deeply distrupting my life.
I saw my doctor today to get sleeping tablets
and a anti depressant called “Zoloft”.
I am trying so hard to forget about her
but nearly every waking hour I am thinking
about the hurt and damage she has caused me.
If she were not so flirtatious and promiscous
I wouldnt really care.
Its a situation of jealousy and anger and loss.
You’re right shes just like a hooker.
Unfortunately tho I was the target.
Best wishes to You Libbel
– Sebbo
Tony77
Sebbo
I realize the pain you are going through.
You just need to pick yourself up man.
Dont let this whore get to you.
Shes traded sex for money – its the “ancient profession”!!
Please – do you really think it was LOVE??
Come on Sebbo. Wake up !
She was after your cash.
After marriage.
After your family connections.
Please Sebbo you need to look at this realistically.
Pining for her is only going to make you go insane.
Why do you think she was so eager to marry?
Most women would wait perhaps 5 months at the
very least ! She gave you 3 weeks?
Please Sebbo I am saying this out of all honesty.
You need to look at this realistically because quite
clearly your comments reveal you have been brainwashed
by a sociopath and the only way out is QUARANTINE.
She was a hooker. Lets face the facts here.
Read the article on female sociopaths.
They have just as much testorone as men.
She wanted sex because it satisfied HER NEED.
It was not for LOVE.
You gave her MONEY, SEX … and she got ther
POWER that she wanted. You were SUPPLYING her.
When the money went dry the Biatch was gone with the wind!
libelle
Dear Sebbo, imagine you being STILL with her and her having intercourse with other men. Just as imagination. See yourself at night awake and her not beside you but with another, richer and younger man. How would you feel THEN?? Imagine your dispair and anger when she returns and laughs into your face, and when you ask her she will threaten to leave you, and as soon as she gets THE RING from the other one she will be gone anyway, but on HER terms.
This time it is on YOUR terms, therefore you doubt your decision because of your stong feelings, feelings you never had before.
You made the right decision. Better an end with terror than terror without an end (or an end on HER terms). After you ripped off her mask by refusing to play along her game you had released her anyway. It would have been a question of days or weeks for her to disappear for good, given her pace.
You should feel pity for the next chap, not envy! He will join your club of x’s broken hearts sooner or later, when the next richer chap shows up.
And with her being so promiscuous I would ask the doctor also for a test for STD and AIDS.
Sebbo_Ricadonna
Dear Libelle
Your comment made me cry.
I am so sad but at the same time I’m so relieved.
Its true, she was out there using sex as a weapon
to seduce men into the trap of marriage and then
probably splitting assets and bank accounts.
I know I “dodged a bullet” but unfortunately for me
it ended on HER terms as she is the one who forced
me into “no contact”.
If it was up to me, I would have ended the realtionship
a lot more amicably, with a sensible adult to adult discussion
but all she could do was tell me via a email and a short
phone COLD phone call.
The threat of a restraining order further shows her “ill will”.
She got it her way but when I sent the email reply
I knew I was not going to get any response so
in fact I had the “last word” but I still feel she has got all
the power.
And no I did not play for power but reading the articles
on this website they often say that sociopaths only think
in terms of power and that “winning is all”.
So even though I dont want to get down to her level,
I still feel cheated and wronged by her very method
of closure which was deeply humiliating for me.
And I know she’s out there screwing other guys as we
speak. Coming from a christian background I found the
whole thing WRONG as I believe a relationship is between
two people but in her sick and twisted world, a “relationship”
involved many people and included networking with the most powerful “influencers” to establish a foothold of power, not only over me but my family and business connections.
She wished me ill will via a restraining order and now I know
why ! I hate her!